


A River in a strange land

by kookyjiin



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Character Study, Hurt/Comfort, Multi, hurt Akira, polythives if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-02
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2019-05-01 09:16:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14517255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kookyjiin/pseuds/kookyjiin
Summary: Akira's bad at hiding things; his friends aren't as dumb as he hopes.-His friends discover the injuries he received from the interrogation.





	A River in a strange land

Akira didn’t really want to show the aftermath of his interrogation to his friends or Sojiro.  
Although the marks had faded since he had first been interviewed by Sae, they were in no way gone completely and a quick visit to the clinic told him it would take several weeks for them to vanish at all.  
The ones that made him feel most sick where the handcuff bruising on his wrists, they ached with every move and he couldn’t rest his wrists on a hard surface for too long before the pain began to shoot through his arms.  
There was also the boot shaped bruise on his thigh that refused to fade, not to mention the many poorly injected bruises on his forearms. 

Each mark made him sick. 

Then there was the other dark sinking thoughts of ‘what if?’ what if they had given slightly more of the drugs, would he have been able to give Sae the phone? He’d probably be dead, and then what?  
Sae had told him anyone who had been through what he had been through would naturally feel shaken, but this didn’t help ease his sleepless nights as he watched Morgana sleep jealous of the fact sleep was avoiding him every night.  
It didn’t help when Futaba, happy to see him one afternoon, grabbed his wrists causing him to let out a string of vulgar words that made Sojiro yell at him.  
Or when Ann patted him on the back and he couldn’t help the loud gasp that escaped him as the injuries sparked.  
Each one expressed concern for him, constantly asking him if he was okay, to which he always assured them he was. 

It was one late night, long after Sojiro had gone home that Akira heard the door bell jingle. This not only set alarm bells ringing as it was late in the evening, and Akira was sure he’d locked the damn door.  
Almost silently Akira made his way down the stairs, lurking in the shadows so as not to be detected, it was only when he heard a familiar voice say;  
“Yeah, I took the spare key off Boss he said it was fine.” That he emerged from the shadows giving the group gathered there one of the biggest frights of their lives.  
“I told you we should have texted him!” Ann yelled clutching at her chest from Akira’s sudden and silent appearance.  
“Even in the real world he is every part a phantom thief. Good evening Akira.” Haru said cheerily as though she hadn’t just snuck into a cafe in the dead of night.  
Cocking his eyebrows at the group he opened his mouth as if to ask why they where here when Yusuke beat him too it.  
“Have you fallen over Akira? What on earth has happened to your arms.”  
Akira froze cat like, his eyes went wide as he realised too late that he was wearing his short sleeved t-shirt which naturally exposed every injury he had been concealing. Almost as one, each eye landed on his wrists then travelled slowly up his arms, past the marks made from needles to his throat where his usual turtleneck usually covered.  
“What the hell happend!?” Ryuji shouted making his way over to Akira to examine the marks on his best friend. “Who did this we’ll make ‘em pay!”  
“Calm down.” Came Akira’s quiet response to which Ann promptly began to shout too.  
“Calm down!? Akira what the hell happened to you! I’ve seen those injures on Shiho and don’t think I don’t recognise that they came from assault! Who did this?!”  
The silence Ann’s words left was deafening.  
Akira should have known better than to try to conceal all this, but in fairness to him he didn’t want to concern nor worry his friends of his injuries. He had sworn Morgana to secrecy only by agreeing to go to the clinic for any medicines that would ease the pain he felt from them.  
“When I was interrogated by the police.” He said simply. Makoto dropped whatever she was holding, it landed on the cafe floor with a dull thunk.  
“The police did this to you?”  
“I know what I signed up for.” Akira said quickly, “I don’t regret it and I won’t regret it.”  
“But you must admit you think about how it could have gone wrong?” Yusuke said to the point causing Futaba to stamp on his foot.  
“I do.” Akira admitted softly, “there was times I thought I wouldn’t get out.” A hand rubbed his stomach gingerly while his other moved to cover the boot shaped bruise on his thigh. “But I had faith in our plan, and you all, I wasn’t going to let you all down.”  
“Man, why didn’t you tell us you were hurtin’ we could have put off going into palaces or mementos for a while?” Ryuiji said concern in his face, but Akira shuck his head.  
“It’s just bruising thats all.”  
“Thats a lie.” Chimed in Morgana who was perched on the counter as per normal. “Tae said he had some broken ribs - he’s been doing regular check ups with her, I can vouch for that.”  
Akira grumbled at the cat a hand coming up to rub his hair, a nervous tick.  
“Look, so they did some messed up shit okay, but I wasn’t about to hold you all back, we need to do this and steal the treasure before anyone realises I’m not actually dead and we faked it all.”  
“But you’re hurting” Said Ann sadly. “And as your friends we want to be able to help you, you shouldn’t hide things like this from us you know? We love you.”  
Akira scuffed his feet slightly as Ryuji nudged his side, this earned a sharp intake of breath from Akira to which Ryuji apologised over and over. Akira however, simply wrapped his arms around the blonde haired boy pulling him tight. Ryuji gave out a squeak.  
It didn’t take long for Futaba to fling herself into the hug, and eventually the phantom thieves collapsed into a heap of arms on the cafe floor.  
“We could change the hearts of those police officers.” Ryuiji said to which Akira gave a breathy laugh.  
“It wouldn’t do anything, but I appreciate it.” He smiled around at them all. 

It took months, like Tae had said, for each of his injuries to fade from sight. And although some would never fade, the scars running against his wrists where the cuffs had dug in deep enough to cut, Akira had almost learnt to live with them.  
During a fateful afternoon in Mementos however, that’s when Akira truly did falter.  
A rather gruelling battle had ensued causing Akira to be constantly switching up his party, and using every tactic he had learnt against the unusually strong foe. This was what Futaba called ‘a boss fight’ fighting the shadow of someone’s heart in Mementos.  
Akira was constantly running through his persona finding weakness and switching party members when they got too tired, like the leader he was, constantly putting his men and women’s safety above his own.  
It was Futaba who noticed it first, doing another scan of the members she noted Akira’s energy levels were starting to dip into the red.  
“Joker, your energy is running low you need to conserve it.”  
Joker made a motion to said he heard her gesturing at the shadow in front of him, taunting it to aim for him, instead of Yusuke who was currently on the ground.  
The taunt worked and, bracing himself, the shadow lunged for Joker instead of Yusuke. 

“I need your hand to sign this but-“ 

Pain shot through his body as he yelled, stumbling backwards he didn’t know if he had been hit by the shadow or if he was just remembering the seering pain from his leg under that mans foot.  
He just knew he had to get away from whatever the hell was causing him pain and fast.  
He heard people shouting, heard footsteps and what sounded like a car or a train growing closer and closer until-  
“Joker stop!” Makoto was smack in front of him holding her arms out wide to prevent him from moving any further down the hall.  
Looking over his shoulder Joker saw he had ran from the scene of the shadow causing the others to know be bolting after him in hot pursuit.  
“Has he been brainwashed?!” Haru cried ready to find something to cure him. “I have a cure for that right here!”  
“No he seems fine” Morgana said inspecting him, just shaken.  
“What happened?” Joker asked staring around at the worried faces of his friends.  
“One sec you were ready to go, the shadow came for you and hit you with a physical… You just sorta took off running” Skull mumbled, “thought you’d been brainwashed…”  
Joker paled under his mask as he pulled at his hair.  
“Sorry.” He said bowing his head a little to each of them.  
“Don’t apologise” Futaba said quickly, “just are you alright? And be truthful…”  
“When the physical hit me I just sort of lost where I was… Remembered the interrogation room.” He rubbed his wrist subconsciously. “Then I don’t remember anything but thinking I needed to get away from whatever was hurting me… That’s all. I’m sorry.” 

There was silence for a second before;  
“Well thank god you weren’t brainwashed because I can’t deal with you trying to shoot the shit out me!” Skull said laughing. Joker looked at him wide eyed. “What? don’t look at me like that! You’re my best mate, you went through hell and back for us and took major damage while you did… You’re bound to be shaken after what you went through… Hell look at me back in Kamoshida’s palace, ya… Do remember that don’t you?”  
Joker nodded. He did remember Ryuiji struggling to stand up to Kamoshida, struggling on the floor of the castle lobby until he realised that Morgana and Akira were about to be killed and he decided to stand up.  
“It took me ages to stand up to that bastard, and you’ve been through much worse than I did, heck we all did, no you did!” Skull argued when Joker tried to stop him. “So if physical attacks hurt you more now, or, like trigger you or whatever then we’re gonna be ‘ere to help you out, alright?”  
“I have to admit I agree.” Fox said a hand on his hip as he swayed thoughtfully. “You have saved each one of us Joker, and now it seems it is our turn to repay you.”  
“You never did as for anything.” Noir said clasping her hands together.  
“But now we can repay you for everything!” Panther cried happily. “You deserve it, and we’re your best friends, we’d be nowhere without you!”  
“That’s right.” Oracle chimed in. “I’d still be in my room. So suck it up buttercup we’re helping you out!”  
Joker watched them all for a second screwing his nose up as he tried with all his will not to get emotional in a dark train subway deep in mementos.  
“I hate to be the one to bring the mood down.” Morgana said, “but I hear chains. Time to go.” 

As the phantom thieves collected themselves all beginning to their counter attack on the shadow Joker had just run from. He listened lazily to their suggestions, of Futaba and Yusuke arguing over how best to prevent physical damage.  
He chuckled to himself his hands lightly gliding over the steering wheel of the Morgana Bus.  
“I love you guys.” He said.  
They smiled.

**Author's Note:**

> I always found it strange that Akira swagged back into the cafe when going through literal physical abuse...  
> I'd have liked to see some canon material and his friends finding out about what he went through, although I suppose it's hinted at if you squint hard enough. 
> 
> Anyway.  
> This is the first time I've ever written a fanfic in around ... 7 years probably (?) and the first time I've ever written a Persona 5 fanfic so I apologise if the characters are OC, or this is poorly written. 
> 
> Any criticism is much appreciated.


End file.
